368 'GOD'S PEACE'
forgot that I -was a grown man. It did me good to sit like that close to her innocent heart. It seemed to me my sorrow softened while she whispered : ' And then it must be beautiful for him to think of, that she will not be lying alone, but will be near his dear mother. These two will speak dear and loving words about him, of that he may be certain, and should he meet with sorrow and misfortune, he will feel their dear shadows comfortingly near him.'
The clergyman, the church's strong scourge for the old town's wickedness, stood in front of Greta's coffin. He cast a severe and searching glance over the congregation, but it was as if he involuntarily understood that here, at this young girl's coffin, in front of these weeping old women and this stricken man, all severity would be sacrilege, and it was as if a light of gentle humanity swept over his sharp features, and when he started to speak his voice trembled.
' I did not personally know this young woman, whom God has taken from us, just as she believed she was to enter on the greatest earthly happiness. But I have heard nothing of her that was not good and beautiful. She seemed, through her own nature, in the high and lonely place where she lived, to have found peace with God and with the world, and she also seems to have had the power of giving peace and strength to those around her. I do not know her nearest friends, those whom her death most affects, and I don't know if they in their sorrow think of the comfort I call the only
